These stockings
seem to be the Holy Grail of medieval knitting.They are evidence of the high level of damask knitting design achieved
before 1600.

The top of the
pouch shows a seed stitch diamond trellis with 4 eyelets inside.These are the earliest use of eyelets that I have seen.

The lower 2/3 is a
mix of double garter stitch(knit 2
rows, purl 2 rows), double seed stitch (k1, p1, repeat for 2 rows; p1, k1,
repeat for 2 rows), and repetitive lines of what used to be a single back seam.I remember wearing knee socks in grade school in the late 60’s from
J.C. Penney’s that had exactly the same pattern of stitches.That was about the time I learned how to knit… coincidence???

The originals are
knit in silk (probably reeled silk that would give them a ‘soft hand.’) at
22 sts/in. or 8 sts/cm.

I knit this pouch
using 2 strands of Gutterman silk sewing thread using #000-000 (.75 mm.).This was the finest silk thread I had access to at the time I began
knitting this.I have since found
several import sources and other imaginative ways of getting fine silk thread
for knitting.

Moving along at a
good clip, knitting 4 to 5 hours per day, I could only create about a centimeter
of fabric per day.That doesn’t
sound nearly as depressing as saying ½ inch in a day.This pouch, though, represents what the norm was during the Middle Ages
in the scale of the knitting that was done by Master Knitters in good standing
in their guilds.